No.6 Episode 8: It’s Saturday! And you know what that means.

“Are you going to save the girl but risk the world’s stability, or are you going to save the world, but never will you meet your “

No. 6 is back with another great episode as Shion and Nezumi visits a hermit and have the truth given to them, as well as revealing the reason why Nezumi hates No. 6 so much. Okay, the reason might sounds a little cliche to some, but at least it’s better than leaving that thread hanging by the time the series ends. For the fans who likes the character developments in here so far, I’m afraid this is a plot-centric episode and I guess that most of the misunderstandings has cleared after seeing the two male leads making up last week. But for everyone else, you won’t be disappointed.

Warning: Awful song ahead. Whether you like it or not, there’s nothing like a great weekend.
Note: I apologize for the rest of the post to be cut off the moment I saw it on the front page around 3:30am. WordPress can sometimes be a bitch sometimes, but good thing they did save my previous revisions of the post. Who knows what will happen to me if that function isn’t around in WordPress…

Hermit: NO, don’t show that photo you fool! Do you want me to die early??? The way I look at it, I don’t remember Rikiga looking that…Eighties back in those good ‘ole days.

Summary: Shion and Nezumi visits a hermit who previously created No. 6 of what it is today along with some others (Karan and Rikiga being some of the members). Nezumi and Safu (still stuck in a liquid chamber) hears the song again from episode 5, with the hermit telling he and Shion of Eriulias, a mysterious being who was the one who sang the song as he reveals Nezumi’s past to him (explaining how Nezumi got his scars as well as his immense hatred for No. 6). Before the boys leaves, the hermit reveals like Shion, he survived the parasite attack before giving all of his research he has done on the parasite and No. 6 to Shion. Back home, Shion, Nezumi, Inukashi and Rikiga started preparations to enter No. 6.

Na na na na na…Bruce Wayne!BATMAN! Random Scientist #4101!!

From where we left off last week, Shion and Nezumi visits a hermit living in a cave who knows everything about the truth behind No. 6 and the likes. But not in the way they like it to be as they were lead to his location like hostages. Using his mind to quickly defend themselves, Nezumi gives him a good reason why No. 6 should go down in order to save Safu, end the game of deception and to a lesser extent, save the citizens of No. 6 of their inevitable demise, as well as showing him a photo that reveals his past identity as an ex-researcher that build No. 6 to where it is in the current timeline.

Between the above situation and Youmin revealing the truth of No. 6’s deception to Karan, Safu, who is once again conscious but still stuck in a liquid chamber overheard a conversation between two scientists in protection suits, calling her the ideal sample, the number of very intelligent people they had sacrificed (the exact number is never revealed, but judging by the tone of those two scientists the number could be truly frightening) and something about synchronization rates with something. As she tried screaming for Shion for help, it leads to Safu, completely fine talking with Shion in a park on a fine day. He tells her that he has given the sweater her grandmother made (in the first episode) to Nezumi, asking Safu to listen to the song. As she listens to the song that she heard back in her trip at No. 5, Shion was gone. Before she could collapse and screams again, Nezumi hears the song and tries his hardest not to faint in front of really mean homeless people right before their eyes.

You want to listen to a song? I’ll give you one. Don’t say you regret listening to it.

As Nezumi puts himself out of danger, the hermit asks him to sing the song he heard. As Nezumi sings (which isn’t the best, but certainly not the worse compared to worse songs I’ve heard so far), the hermit seems to recognize it, the cave starts glowing and the homeless people began wailing for help before warning Shion of the harsh truth he’s about to reveal. The hermit tells Nezumi and Shion that the song belongs to a mysterious being named Eriulias. From there, he explains how he and his crew created No. 6 after a devastating war that made only six regions left inhabitable for humans. The hermit and his crew then tried creating a utopia but like every other story something has to go wrong. The higher-ups controlling No. 6 then became greedy, and with the people who opposed them will be eliminated from their sight, never to be seen by their closed ones again. Then the hermit met Eriulias, who is described as a powerful queen (queen bees/wasps, anyone?) who possesses a great power that is so powerful that made the No. 6 higher ups seeking after her, hence the invasion of Nezumi’s home and the slaughter of his people named the “People of the Forest”. Nezumi was the only survivor and the last remaining People of the Forest after the authorities burned down everything, hence explaining the scars on his back, his hatred for No. 6 and his cynical personality.

Before Shion and Nezumi leave, the hermit entrust his research material to Shion. Comparing the hermit on the photo and eye-to-eye appearance, like Shion, he was also a survivor of the parasite attack, explaining his white hair and sudden aging. At No. 6, Youmin shows Karan a photo of his wife and son, who are like Shion and Safu, taken away by the authorities and are gone from the eyes of the public. The former starts hugging Karan and convince her to join his group which is intending to bring No. 6 down after seeing their loved ones taken away, but Karan declined the offer, asking him if she could give her time to think and told him that she cannot become a substitute of Youmin’s missing wife. Returning from their little mindblowing trip, Rikiga and Inukashi were waiting for them as they make preparations to bring down No. 6 once and for all and save Safu from the clutches of evvvviiilllll~~~

Thou shall not kill. You kill those people, you’ll be like them. I’ll get back at you once everything’s over, that forsaken goddamn song…

Youmin, your wife is irreplaceable. To the left, please. I need to get myself a freaking piece of bread.

…I know what Nezumi forced you to do at night. There’s no need for you to hide anymore. From now on, I will be your knight in shining armor.

Thoughts: Let me make this clear: You said that No. 6 is made out of the six fertile lands left on Earth and there are still forests, fertile lands outside those six areas? No number is given to it? Man, hermit, for a one-brilliant man you need to exercise your brain once in a while. I mean, what kind of logic is that? Oh, and remember kids; science, wealth and advancement is bad. Very bad. They ruin society as a whole. Plus, a hooray for the lack of mood swings Nezumi always implements in each episode. Plus with the female clothes that he wore as a child, this can go in many ways (not to mention having a female stage name and acting as female characters now that I recall…).

For ‘Friday’ haters, I apologize for putting the lyrics in this post. Can’t help it; have been reading too many fics with ‘Friday’ as part of the story.

Eight down, three more to go.

Another crack theory: Lili is Eriulias. Don’t ask me why. I just feel that she needs to have an importance since everyone else has played a part (hell, even Youmin is a member of a No. 6 resistance group as of this episode) and she might be in the form of a little girl to spy on the citizens of No. 6. You may never know (looks at QB and raged how many little girls’ lives he has ruined). And oh look, it looks like she’s back after an absence that spans a couple of episodes.

Remember bois and gals, the old ways are the only method to salvation. Give up science; see how many lives it has ruined?

Only in anime you can be melodramatic screaming your son’s name without anyone looking at you like a freak. I can see why there aren’t any customers visiting the bakery. I laughed.

Remember in Episode 1, where Shion gave us that long winding summary of the world? The country where they lived has been devastated by nuclear war, leaving only six habitable areas, which then became the cities No. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6. The country. Not the world. Everywhere else besides that country is habitable. Only that country suffered huge losses from the nuclear war (presumably some statement about the nuclear bomb on Japan, etc. etc. blah blah blah).

Karan and Rikiga don’t have to have been part of the reconstruction team – maybe the two were merely students of hermit-san in their youth? And then hermit-san continued with a bunch of other people to start building the future utopia. Rikiga seems like a dumbass (he’ll probably reveal himself to be SUPER SMART / a government spy in a future episode), and Karan is even more of a dumbass, not knowing anything about No. 6. Youming is the most suspicious person so far – how does he know so much about No. 6? Shouldn’t the government crack down on his network? I’m pretty sure he’s actually a government agent, either working to completely eliminate everybody in his network or to deliberately cause unrest among the people as some sort of massive scientific experiment on mob psychology.

Hermit-san isn’t really a hermit, either, since, y’know, HE’S SURROUNDED BY HUNDREDS OF OTHER PEOPLE. Also, they’re not homeless, seeing as THEY HAVE A HOME AND THEY’RE LIVING THERE. :vvv

I feel like I’m playing the Devil’s Advocate or something here, but noitaminA always wants us to see all sides of a scenario, not just go along with ‘man No. 6 sucks and Shion’s right and he’ll succeed and many hermit-san knows the TRUTH and the government is BAD and EVIL and wants to KILL EVERYONE because that’s a BAD thing to do and the government is BAD’. How does hermit-san know the ‘truth’? Not only is there not just one truth (contrary to a certain detective’s ramblings), but hermit-san was evicted from the city. He was just a scientist, not a leader. How does he know what the government is doing? Besides, why would No. 6 fall into an ‘inevitable demise’ because of their ‘game of deception’? How is this a game at all? And if people like Shion didn’t exist, why would they fall? Everybody in the West District hates No. 6, but No. 6 still hasn’t fallen. Besides, even if it did, does that automatically save Safu? Why would it? The government has no motive in purposefully bringing the city ‘down’ – their only possible motive that way is to get more ‘power’, but then their lower-downs would have no reason to obey them – after all, No. 6 is basically communistic. It seems like it isn’t, what with Shion getting a job and all, but how could Karan live without working if it weren’t? Wealth is bad, as it promotes greed – No. 6 is a city of science and advancement. The more you think about it, the more it feels like all one big scientific study. Where would the witnesses of the bees go? They couldn’t just kill them all. Of course, they’re transferred out of the study or something – the bees themselves make sense when you imagine this as an experiment of mob reactions to panic scenarios. To conclude this little ramble, whoever said society was good? Look at all the problems with society we have now. Why should we sacrifice science for the sake of society?

I probably just don’t understand your tone (you could as well be dripping as sarcasm), and I do realize I’m contradicting myself, so I guess I’ll back down with ‘lol my opinion is weird’. Some last notes, though:

I’m not sure I understand this sentence: “The higher-ups controlling No. 6 then became greedy, and with the people who opposed them will be eliminated from their sight, never to be seen by their closed ones again.”

Neither Shion nor hermit-san has aged – if he had aged, hermit-san would probably be dead right now, seeing how many years has passed since the photo with Karan. Likewise, though Shion is now albino, he has not aged either – if he had, wouldn’t he grow taller, being not fully through puberty yet?

tl;dr: THE CAVE STARTS GLOWING

P.S. The random scientist looks like Rintarou.
P.P.S. Wow don’t actually read this comment I don’t know what I was saying
P.P.P.S. I wonder if there’s an edit function here…
P.P.P.P.S. EDITING COMMENTS LIKE A MUSHROOM

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